


Keeping House

by Gort



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: Domestic Fluff, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-15
Updated: 2016-04-15
Packaged: 2018-06-02 11:06:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 971
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6563824
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gort/pseuds/Gort
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dawn is getting a little tired of of stumbling into awkward situations involving her sister.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Keeping House

**Author's Note:**

> Set in Rome, post-BtVS finale. Can be considered a companion to Journaling but really all you need to know is that Spike is living in Rome. Ignores comic-verse.
> 
> Complete and utter fluff.

“Hello?” Dawn called, unlocking the apartment door and heading for the kitchen. She was pretty sure her sister would be awake by now, but the vampire, well, she wasn’t taking any bets.

Dawn set her groceries down and peeked around the corner at their bedroom door. Open, huh. She listened intently, relaxing when it at least _sounded_ like they hadn’t just forgotten to close it again. She really needed to convince Buffy to let her move in with Jeanette. So what if she wasn’t eighteen until next year? She seriously shouldn’t know this much about her sister’s sex life.

“Buffy?” Dawn frowned. The apartment wasn’t that big, and it was still daylight outside, so at the very least Spike should be lazing around somewhere. “Guys?”

She shrugged and ducked back into the kitchen before stopping short. The tiny room off the kitchen had been described by the landlord as a ‘dining room’ but they’d never found a table that would fit in it so mostly it was where Andrew had kept his toys (action figures, whatever). She could just see the edges of a curtain fluttering in the breeze through the hazy glass of the narrow door. The balcony door must be open.

Dawn carefully crept across the kitchen, her heart pounding. The apartment was only two stories up, so it was certainly possible for someone to come in the house that way. Or maybe she’d just been watching too many old Cary Grant movies. Dawn grabbed a frying pan from the drying rack above the sink and took a deep breath. Maybe the cat-burglar had knocked out Buffy and Spike? Dawn made a face. Or maybe they were just down in the laundry room. Spike had a weird thing about the scent of laundry soap that Dawn seriously hoped he never tried to explain to her again. Especially not while Buffy was perched on a dryer wearing her shirt inside-out.

Dawn moved toward the glass door and turned the knob, quietly letting herself into the small room. It was empty now that Andrew had moved into his own place down the hall and she really wasn’t expecting the door to bump into anything as it swung open. So of course she let out an undignified yelp when it did, raising the pan in her hand.

“Bloody hell, bit!” Spike looked up at her, annoyed.

Dawn tried to recover herself, clutching her chest as she took great gulps of air. “What the hell…” she trailed off, her eyes narrowing. Spike was lounging in the shadows on the divan from the living room with a book splayed across his chest, which really wasn’t that unusual, but the rest of it sure the hell was. “What are you _wearing_?”

Spike glanced down. “Laundry day,” he said evasively. Dawn lifted her eyebrows. She’d never seen the clothes he was wearing before in her _life_. They looked all weird and old-fashioned, and reminded her of the really long version of Pride and Prejudice. Well, mostly the wet Mr. Darcy part, because that was pretty much the only part worth remembering.

“Uh-huh,” Dawn said in as sarcastic a tone as she could muster.

“Honey?” Buffy poked her head around one of the fluttering curtains and Dawn stared at her in confusion. “You stopped rea…oh. Hi, Dawnie.” She gave a little wave, a trowel in her hand.

“Are you gardening?” Dawn asked in disbelief.

Buffy glanced at Spike. “Yes?”

Dawn took in Buffy’s outfit. The white skirt was much longer than the ones Buffy usually wore. It was floaty and gauzey and Dawn made a mental note to steal it later, because it was perfect for getting ice cream on the piazza. Her sister was also wearing a button up shirt that made her look positively _prim_. There was a smudge of dirt on her cheek.

“You kill plants just by looking at them,” Dawn pointed out.

“Well, it was a nice day and I thought I’d try again,” Buffy replied haughtily. “What are you doing home, anyways?”

“Half-day,” Dawn tilted her head at both of them suspiciously before her mouth dropped open. “Oh my god, is this some kind of demented sex-game?”

“What? No!” Buffy’s face immediately turned bright red and Spike hid a smirk behind his book. “I was just...and Spike was keeping me company, that’s all!”

Dawn held up her hand. “I’m going to Andrew’s. Possibly forever. Please put away the groceries and find me a therapist because I’m going to need one.” She stomped out of the room muttering about freakish vampires and crazy sisters, tossing the pan onto the counter and slamming the apartment door behind her loudly enough so they could hear that she’d gone.

Dawn stood in the dim hallway of their building and sighed. She hoped Andrew was home. And she would never, ever tell Buffy this, but she was glad they were happy. She just wished they’d stop being happy where she could _see_ it.

She knocked on Andrew’s door and he opened it after a minute, his hair flattened on one side. “Sorry,” Dawn said, stepping into his apartment. “Long night?”

Andrew yawned and scratched his head. “Yeah, having my guild in a different time zone is making it super hard to coordinate raids.”

Dawn debated telling him she had no idea what he was talking about, but that had stopped being true months ago. “Well, I’m starving and I left all my groceries in the apartment. Take-out?”

“What happened?” Andrew looked worried.

Dawn rolled her eyes. “Nothing, they’re fine. And also possibly pretending they’re keeping house in the nineteenth century.”

“Ooh, I love cosplay!”

Dawn ignored him and opened the fridge before quickly closing it again. Yeah, Jeanette’s was probably a better choice. “Well I prefer this century. Where’s your phone? Indian sound good?”


End file.
